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Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People, MOSOP, has urged the Federal Government to clear the names of the murdered Ogoni leader, Ken Saro-Wiwa and the eight others and declare them innocent, adding that pardon would not be accepted by the Ogoni people.
The apex decision-making organ of MOSOP, the Steering Committee, also known as Central Committee took this position in a ten-point communiqué by Prince Biira Nkpah, Publicity Secretary, after a two-day meeting of the body in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
“The communique reads “We reject the proposed plan to pardon the late Ogoni leader and sage, Ken Saro Wiwa and other compatriots, who were gruesomely murdered by the state in November 1995.
“The committee contends that their deaths were consequent upon an executive decision of the then military government for a crime they did not commit.
“We call on the Federal Government to clear the names of our fallen heroes of culpability for murder.
“That Mr. President acknowledged rightly and described the processes and execution of the Ogoni activists as “unfortunate” implies that the processes were not only flawed but ought not to have happened.
“The haste with which the execution was carried out even when the period of clemency had not elapsed and pleas from the international community ignored, expressed the bias of the then military government against our compatriots.
“Therefore, the best any civil government will do in this case is to clear their names by declaring them innocent and abolish the death penalty as practised in all civilised countries of the world.
“We note that while the body is not opposed to resumption of oil production in Ogoni, we are totally opposed to the primitive and conflict laden approach being adopted.
“We insist that for oil extraction to resume, it must be preceded by a broad based consultation and agreements reached with the people.
“The committee rejects the confirmed understanding between NNPC, NPDC and some top Abuja based politicians and their collaborators to sublet OML 11 to Sahara Energy, which represents the economic interest of the aforementioned groups.
“It vowed to mobilise the people to resist any attempt by any company to enter Ogoni through the back door to explore and exploit our oil and gas resources without our social licence.”
